jeff@dciem.UUCP (Jeff Richardson) (06/21/85)
Music videos have caught on and are a strong factor in the music industry, but
I can do without them. I think the concept is a good one; in fact, I thought
of the idea back in the 70's before anybody was doing them. I would
probably have made a couple myself if I had all the resources at my
disposal, so when I heard a few years ago that people were doing videos,
I was thrilled and very anxious to see what they had come up with. When
I finally did, I was very disappointed. My idea of a video was to have
the picture tell the same story and create the same moods as the music,
in such a way that they compliment each other, i.e. the whole is greater
than the sum of the parts. There have been some videos made this way;
I think Bronski Beat's "Smalltown Boy" does a pretty good job of it,
though I visualised it for more abstract songs like Pink Floyd's "Echoes",
which conjures up some great visual images in my mind. The problem with
that is that "Echoes" may conjure up different images for somebody else, so
my concept is probably better for songs like "Smalltown Boy" that have
less room for interpretation, though I'm sure people would get much more
enjoyment out of a video for a song like "Echoes" if it doesn't conflict
with any of their pre-conceived visual images. Anyway, what bugs me is
that videos like "Smalltown Boy" are few and far between. More than 95%
of the videos around are, in my opinion, useless. Most of them have
nothing to do with the song, and the overabundance of lip-synching really
annoys me. (There's nothing wrong with having the artists appear in the
video, though even that isn't necessary, but lip-synching should be kept
to a minimum.) But what annoys me most is that recording artists now feel
obligated to do a video for every hit song, otherwise they won't be
successful. In addition to stacking the odds further against new artists
that can't afford to do videos, it means that there are a lot of bad videos
around. As a result, I almost never watch video shows, so I miss all of the
good videos too. Some songs just don't make good videos, and if you can't
do a good video, you shouldn't do one at all. Videos are another good
idea ruined by excess.
--
Jeff Richardson, DCIEM, Toronto (416) 635-2073
{linus,ihnp4,uw-beaver,floyd}!utcsri!dciem!jeff
{allegra,ihnp4,linus,decvax}!utzoo!dciem!jeffdsi@unccvax.UUCP (Dataspan Inc) (06/26/85)
I don't think you've much to worry about. Since 'music videos' have
caught on, CBS has decided to charge rent for airing them, which in major
markets can be up to $2000/mo. I suspect the other recording conglomerates
will follow suit.
This will have the effect eliminating minor stains like Ma and Pa's
UHF station attempting to compete with MTV Networks' channels. (Do you
detect a connection here? Noooooo. . .) Perhaps music will then regress
back to being audio only, at least in non-cable households!
And now, a flame about music videos:
Just what is it that the music video people don't want us to see? Despite
the best efforts of your SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture and Television
Engineers) to provide you with high quality standards for the production
of both film and videotape programmes, music videos in general look like
death warmed over. (My spouse would say that they expose the film way
too much in the toe of the D-logE curve). The blacks are consistently
compressed, the colours are highly pasty and unrealistic, and the programme
in general is always penalized with heavy doses of film grain and / or
electronic noise.
No, MTV does not have the ultraenhanced look, of, say, The Nashville
Network (which seems to insert their chrominance about 3 dB hot) but
whoever produces this garbageola needs remedial composition courses. I'll
be happy to show them news actualities shot by tech school grads with
much more pizzaz!
Video with music can be an enjoyable experience, disjoint or related
(Cat Stevens' compositions for "Harold and Maude" come to mind here) and
in and of itself isn't such a bad thing. Music videos, on the other hand,
are such a depressing experience, because there seems to be a (not
necessarily overt) conspiracy to present the visual material in an obviously
depressing way. No, I don't accept that the present technique of playing
a music bed over actors who obviously don't have the slightest idea of
what they are doing as being some new art form, it is just extremely
poor videography/cinematography. If videos could convey some sense of
the acoustic space of the music (which your brain has no trouble interpreting)
rather than present the exact same music we here day after day on top 40,
they would take a giant step forward in maturity and class.
I just don't buy that most music video productions are high buck
affairs! If this stuff is going to major national laboratories for
processing and transfer, then I'd vote for a conspiracy (then again, no
amount of processing can correct for bad composition and exposure). However,
there is better quality control at your local Jiffy Foto Prints-In-An-Hour
place!
(above paragraph, I meant hear, of course, not here)
-- Flames off --
Now, I can see their point of view... they're aiming this crap at people
who obviously don't give a damn about audio, much less video; if the music's
dynamic range is going to be flat, loud, and lifeless, why not the corresponding
video, too.
Whoever follows up to this, please move (or add, as appropriate) this to
net.video/net.tv. Thanks
Davidnessus@mit-eddie.UUCP (Doug Alan) (06/27/85)
["Hey Marvin, I didn't know you could hum Pink Floyd!"] > From Jeff Richardson (dciem!jeff) > Anyway, the problem is that videos like "Smalltown Boy" are few and > far between. More than 95% of the videos around are, in my opinion, > useless. Most of them have nothing to do with the song, and the > overabundance of lip-synching really annoys me. (There's nothing > wrong with having the artists appear in the video, though even that > isn't necessary, but lip-synching should be kept to a minimum.) I largely agree with you, Jeff, on your opinions about videos, but I don't agree with you about lip-synching. There are lots of awful videos that use no lip-synching, and lots of great videos that do use lip-synching. Whether lip-synching is used or not should be determined by what the video is trying to convey. For example, if is is decided that the song should be presented as a message from the artist (or a character put on by the artist) to you the viewer, then lip-synching seems very appropriate. > (I've never seen any of Peter Gabriel's videos or any from "The > Dreaming".) Kate Bush, Peter Gabriel, and Laurie Anderson all lip-synch in most of their videos, and their videos are all very good. The video for Peter Gabriel's "Shock the Monkey" is probably the best video ever made, and he lip-synchs in that. (Actually, the best video ever made, is probably the "The Wall" movie! Especially the animated parts! Wow!!! There's very little lip-synching in it, but you're not going to see any of it on Empty-V, which is oh so concerned about not showing anything with too much sex or violence that might offend someone. Right.) "There's no one driving" Doug Alan nessus@mit-eddie.UUCP (or ARPA) P.S. EMI-America now says the release of Kate Bush's new album has been rescheduled tentatively for September 12! So much for Keyboard magazine saying the long wait is over! This is like having a carrot dangled in front of one's nose. And does anyone know anything about a new album (besides "Birdy") from Peter Gabriel? He's just as overdue for an album as Kate Bush is!
keithd@cadovax.UUCP (Keith Doyle) (06/29/85)
[..............]
I have to agree that lip-synching sucks. If there is anything I can't
stand (that I can identify) about music videos, is watching people pretend
to sing, pretend to play the guitar etc.. Why? It's so blatantly obvious,
that all I can see is that the jerks are mouthing the words. And, usually
the vocalist has such an exagerated opinion of himself that they close up
on him for long period of time so that all you see is one big 'puppet' face
pretending to sing.
Another thing I can't stand, is groups who pretend to be giving a live concert
during the video. MOST heavy metal groups seem to do this sort of thing,
just arrange their instruments on a stage similar to how they do in concert,
and then proceed to act the whole thing out. A good demonstration of how
'shallow' they really are beyond their canned stage show.
Keith Doyle
# {ucbvax,ihnp4,decvax}!trwrb!cadovax!keithddwl10@amdahl.UUCP (Dave Lowrey) (07/01/85)
> Another thing I can't stand, is groups who pretend to be giving a live concert > during the video. MOST heavy metal groups seem to do this sort of thing, > just arrange their instruments on a stage similar to how they do in concert, > and then proceed to act the whole thing out. A good demonstration of how > 'shallow' they really are beyond their canned stage show. > > Keith Doyle Many, but not all, of those "live" concerts were truly live concerts when they were filmed. They then overdub the film with the album. -- ------------------------------------------------------------------- Dave Lowrey "To vacillate or not to vacillate, that is the question.... ....or is it?" ...!(<sun,cbosgd,ihnp4}!amdahl!dwl10 [ The opinions expressed <may> be those of the author and not necessarily those of his most eminent employer. ]
elf@utcsri.UUCP (Eugene Fiume) (07/02/85)
[] > There are lots of awful videos > that use no lip-synching, and lots of great videos that do use > lip-synching. Whether lip-synching is used or not should be determined > by what the video is trying to convey. For example, if is is decided > that the song should be presented as a message from the artist (or a > character put on by the artist) to you the viewer, then lip-synching > seems very appropriate. > > Doug Alan nessus@mit-eddie.UUCP (or ARPA) I largely disagree with this (thereby agreeing with Jeff), but that's just a matter of personal whim. But check out Godley and Creme's new video for "Cry". There, the lip-synch technique is taken to an extreme, with different faces dissolving into one another, all of which are "synching" the words to the song. I find the video somewhat disturbing but very entertaining. The dissovling reminds me somewhat of "composite videos" that have been in the SIGGRAPH film show the last couple of outings. I think some MITer's (MITians?) did those. Does anyone have more info on whether Godley and Creme borrowed their technique? Eugene Fiume {decvax|allegra}!utcsri!elf
tp@ndm20 (07/11/85)
>Many, but not all, of those "live" concerts were truly live concerts >when they were filmed. They then overdub the film with the album. Are you sure about that or just guessing? I've only seen a few groups that were tight enough in concert and followed an album closely enough to make that work, and NONE of those are heavy metal. Don't get me wrong, I like metal (among lots of other things), but I have few illusions about it. The only band I have seen that played that close to the sound of their album was Boston, and that simple fact made their concert incredibly boring (to me anyway). I know of other groups that are good enough to do it, but in general the live performance differs somewhat from the album (classic Kansas comes to mind, for instance).
markv@dartvax.UUCP (Mark F. Vita) (07/13/85)
> > >Many, but not all, of those "live" concerts were truly live concerts > >when they were filmed. They then overdub the film with the album. > > Are you sure about that or just guessing? I've only seen a few > groups that were tight enough in concert and followed an album > closely enough to make that work, and NONE of those are heavy metal. > > Don't get me wrong, I like metal (among lots of other things), > but I have few illusions about it. The only band I have seen that > played that close to the sound of their album was Boston, and that > simple fact made their concert incredibly boring (to me anyway). I > know of other groups that are good enough to do it, but in general > the live performance differs somewhat from the album (classic Kansas > comes to mind, for instance). I find this contention that live Boston sounded close to the album version(s) surprising. I don't see how they could do it--there's so much overdubbed guitar, etc. And didn't Delp do all his own backing vocals? How did they handle this in concert? BTW, where/when did you see them in concert? Have you heard any more about rumors that there will be a third Boston album? -- Mark Vita Dartmouth College USENET: {decvax,cornell,linus,astrovax}!dartvax!markv ARPA: markv%dartmouth@csnet-relay CSNET: markv@dartmouth
mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) (07/17/85)
[reference at end] I really like videos, although I'll admit that there are lots of trashy ones. I tend to divide them up into a few classes: 1) "How many angles can you shoot the band from" Self-explanitory; these are almost always very boring. 2) Stories: these are the kind that Jeff is talking about. These are frequently interesting, but they only work for songs with stories. 3) "Image" videos: I think these are the most prevalent kind. Here we break down from plot and just show pictures. Erotic videos fall here. 4) Hallucinations: Forget pictures. These are so strange and incoherent that no other word will do. Other categories may spring to mind. I think story videos were doomed from the start; too many songs have no plot to hang on. It doesn't bother me. I'm sort of a collector of really strange videos, and most story videos aren't wierd enough by far. A video can help a borderline song, but something that's positively bad is beyond help. You have to have something to hang the images on. Also, another trend which Jeff does NOT remark upon is writing a song for a movie, and then having a video to sell the movie through the song. In article <1584@dciem.UUCP> jeff@dciem.UUCP (Jeff Richardson) writes: >Music videos have caught on and are a strong factor in the music industry, >but I can do without them. I think the concept is a good one; in fact, I >thought of the idea back in the 70's before anybody was doing them. I would >probably have made a couple myself if I had all the resources at my >disposal, so when I heard a few years ago that people were doing videos, >I was thrilled and very anxious to see what they had come up with. When >I finally did, I was very disappointed. My idea of a video was to have >the picture tell the same story and create the same moods as the music, >in such a way that they compliment each other, i.e. the whole is greater >than the sum of the parts. There have been some videos made this way; >I think Bronski Beat's "Smalltown Boy" does a pretty good job of it, >though I visualised it for more abstract songs like Pink Floyd's "Echoes", >which conjures up some great visual images in my mind. The problem with >that is that "Echoes" may conjure up different images for somebody else, so >my concept is probably better for songs like "Smalltown Boy" that have >less room for interpretation, though I'm sure people would get much more >enjoyment out of a video for a song like "Echoes" if it doesn't conflict >with any of their pre-conceived visual images. Anyway, what bugs me is >that videos like "Smalltown Boy" are few and far between. More than 95% >of the videos around are, in my opinion, useless. Most of them have >nothing to do with the song, and the overabundance of lip-synching really >annoys me. (There's nothing wrong with having the artists appear in the >video, though even that isn't necessary, but lip-synching should be kept >to a minimum.) But what annoys me most is that recording artists now feel >obligated to do a video for every hit song, otherwise they won't be >successful. In addition to stacking the odds further against new artists >that can't afford to do videos, it means that there are a lot of bad videos >around. As a result, I almost never watch video shows, so I miss all of the >good videos too. Some songs just don't make good videos, and if you can't >do a good video, you shouldn't do one at all. Videos are another good >idea ruined by excess.